We all grew up understanding that no two snowflakes are alike. Though we all personally are not going to be able to prove this, being the size of a snowflake and how many there are, we grew up understanding it. Well the same goes for your Social Media strategy that you should be using for your business.

Every social media platform has its own identity, demographics and purpose. So why would we treat them all the same? That is what a lot of companies are doing these days. They are posting the same content and graphics across the platforms they use the same way. In my opinion that means if i follow a company on or 3 of its platforms I am seeing the same thing in all 3 places. Most people would unfollow on a couple of them if they see that.

So does that mean I need to do triple the amount of the work now? Well not triple, it means understanding the platforms and the people that use that platform.

The great thing about multiple platforms for a company is that you can repurpose (re-use) work you have done before over and over. If you have a blog for example, you could post it on Facebook, and then do an add for it with a different graphic or video lead-in. The content is the same but the lead-in is different. Now this same blog can then be posted on Instagram or Twitter, or any other platform. The idea is to make it fit the platform and change it up a bit. By making it look different, where one person might have skipped over it on one platform, it might have caught there eye on another.

So understanding that each platform has a different personality is the first step, let’s go over a few of the big ones:

Facebook:

We all know that Facebook is the giant gorilla in the room. If you are not using them for business….I don’t know what to say. As of writing this they have over 1.7 Billion people on it. So Facebook was set up as a Friends and Family platform. It still is to this day and that s why the algorithm is set that way. Friends and Family posts first. So how do we work it? We need to remember our graphics that way. Emotional and educational to the friends and family. What we want most on Facebook is shares. When people share it shows up on their timeline and gets to their friends and family.

Twitter:

Twitter is more of a conversational place but in the “NOW” moment. Quick and sometimes repetitive. Twitter is great at having conversations and reaching out to people that are to get to the first time. The thing about twitter is that it moves so fast, I am talking about over 7000 tweets per second , or in other words over 604,800,000 million tweets a day! Whew I am tired just thinking about that. But what is great about it is you can put your information up there multiple times throughout the day. If you post right now , the average tweet will be out of site in about 1-2 hours. So information you want to share should be put up 3-4 times a day, remember people check twitter different times of day also. Also multiple days are good to spread it out. My blog itself goes out every 5 hours for 3-4 days on twitter. with many tweets in between. (Yes this is where the scheduler comes into play to do it for you.)

Instagram:

Instagram is more visual related so the graphics need to be amazing to catch your eye.

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Just learned recently having Red and Blues in your photo are huge plusses. Red for Passion and fiery and Blue for Calmness and Comfort. Mixing these 2 colors on different areas of your graphic creates an emotional response inside a person.

Instagram’s bio is where you can put your link to where you would like to send them, but remember if you change your link, later someone going through your bio won’t have access to past ideas, sales or information. What I love most about Instagram, (as I do Twitter) is the ability of Hashtags (remember the “#” pound sign?) Using hashtags to market to your target niche is KEY!!! This brings more people that would like it to notice your content faster.

LinkedIn:

Now LinkedIn is the Elephant in the room. Many people see LinkedIn as just a place for professionals and looking for a job. OH MY are they wrong. Yes it is more professional then the other social media sites. However the ability to share information, searching out to connect with the correct type of people, groups to assist people and messaging system are what I see as amazing. You are not really going to see puppy;s and baby pictures on here. You are not going to see status updates about family and friends here. You are going to have the ability to share your wealth of information with others and at the same time gather information for yourself.

So these are the top Social Media Platforms, yes there are others. (YouTube, Pinterest, Google + and many others.) The whole idea is to understand that your content needs to fit the platform and be shown that way. Keeping everything across the board doesn’t get you seen, nor help.

So the Snowflake Strategy is being unique on each platform. and most of all don’t be like others. Too many people already doing that. The extra time you might have to add now to get this started, might be what you need to build your business on Social Media today. It is you being you, but understanding the platform that counts.

Isn’t it amazing what snow can teach us?

Looking forward to your comments on your views about being different and the Snowflake Strategy.

Robert C. Stern is the CEO and Founder of The Social Leader. Helping companies and individuals harness the power of Social Media for Business. Please Like us on our Facebook Pageor follow us on Twitter.